Page 13 of Never and Always
Chapter 4
“I’m sorry.We understand your worry but there’re no updates yet,” said the officer on thephone.
Mia sighed and pressed her hand to her cheek. At least this officer hadn’t come across as rude and uncaring like the last. Although, to be fair, this was her fifth call to them since last night. The second since this morning, and it was only ten. She made her first call for the day to the Florida Capitol police after Glenn camein.
She was still in Nick’s room. Mia had been in a much needed slumber but was still aware when Glenn cameback.
She could hear him, had recognized the way he shuffled around, and the panic she felt over the art collection returned to her. It woke her up immediately. Since Nick wasn’t there she made her way back to herroom.
“Thank you. I understand,” Mia toldher.
“It’s also best to wait to hear from us. We do always get in touch the minute we get updates,” the officer offered, still with that calm voice, even though she was essentially telling Mia not to callback.
It was the “don’t call us, we’ll call you” message that Mia was also dreading to hear. It took away what little control she had left. All she wanted to know was if they could confirm that the paintings were safe, and if they’d tracked Alan down with the money. She knew the latter would be truly difficult but thought they’d be able to help more with thecollection.
She’d been trying to contact the storage facility since she discovered the passwords missing but had no luck in speaking with anyone. It wasn’t the kind of place that had someone on site to deal with customer queries. Anything query-related was dealt with by appointment of a week in advance, or they’d respond by email within the same time frame if the query didn’t warrant a face-to-face meeting. It was a terrible set up to give any form of headsup.
She thought of driving down there herself, but the reason why she’d written down the passwords to their unit was that it was one she would definitely not remember. And it wasn’t as if she could ask Glenn for assistance because he’d know straightaway that there was a problem. On this matter, it would either be the police or the facility staff that couldhelp.
“Okay, I’ll wait to hear,” Mia replied. It was best to agree and act like it was fine, even though really she wanted toscream.
“Good bye.” The officer hung up the phone and Mia threw hers onto her bed. It bounced off and dropped onto the floor, making a loudthud.
She rested against the wall, not bothering to go over and pick itup.
What the hell was she going todo?
She was so worried about the art collection, so damn worried. She should have told Nick about it. OrGlenn.
Yesterday, when she said the inheritance was gone, she should have voiced her worries over the collection, too. It would have been natural at that point to follow up what she said with the fact that Alan took the passwords to Hamptons aswell.
Her fear silenced her, and now her anxiety was making her see that she looked like she’d hidden it from him. Which yes, she knew shehad.
Looking like you were hiding something and actually hiding it were different. Hiding something without anyone knowing or suspecting still came with the chance to share what was going on. However, when you looked like you were hiding something and you were, it made the situation a hundred timesworse.
Glenn was already furious with her and hurt. She knew that by keeping something so important as the collection away from him was only going to cause moretrouble.
Mia made her way to the window and sat on the chair besideit.
She remembered this being her thinking spot as a child and through herteens.
Everything in here was the same as she left it. She hadn’t slept in this house for a long time, and last night she still didn’t sleep in herroom.
The last night she spent in here was the night before she left for Florida. She was so excited, although she’d had the biggest argument with her parents, who’d tried to get her tostay.
They believed she’d struggle to make it on her own and build up a client base. They threw all manner of worries at her to give her something to be concerned about but hadn’t managed to shake her faith in herself. Glenn had been adamant but supportive at the time. He’d pacified the situation enough to diffuse it, and then she set off to Florida with the hope in her heart that she’d dowell.
Who would have thought that it would all blow up in her face yearslater?
The day when she realized she wanted to be a beauty therapist was still clear in her mind. It was that light-bulb moment for her when it suddenly became obvious to her that it was an area that she was naturally good at and could pursue with no trouble atall.
Apart from practically living at the salon and spa in town, she loved making up her own natural treatments and remedies for her skin and hair. That was something she did effortlessly and knew exactly what ingredients to combine to achieve a desiredeffect.
Heck, she even went a little deeper and knew specifics that no one thought of. Like how making a banana-and-oat mask with a banana that was just about to go rotten has certain enzymes that not only worked great as an alpha hydroxyl but also a fantastic moisturizer. It was the chemical reaction that took place at that point that made the banana very sweet to taste, but also slightlysour.
Back in Florida her blissful banana-and-wild-rolled-oat facials were a best seller, and the fact that it could be used across all skin types kept people coming back formore.
That was just one thing. She knew a number of treatments like that that were all amazing, and the best thing was that they were made up from her own devices and imagination. She had the ability to enhance something that was average and well known into something that wasremarkable.
